Gracie Gold third after missteps at Skate America

HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill. — All you needed to know about how the women's short programs went Saturday at Skate America was evident in the mixed reactions of several skaters when they had finished.

As Russia's Elizaveta Tukhtamysheva sat in the "Kiss and Cry" area, waiting with a smile for the scores, her coach, Alexei Mishin, raised Tukhtamysheva's arm as if he were a referee signaling the winner of a boxing match.

As U.S. champion Gracie Gold sat there 10 minutes later, watching a replay of key moments in her performance, she covered her face with the collar of her warm-up jacket in mock embarrassment over a bungled final spin. That botch had left her coach, Frank Carroll, and her choreographer, Lori Nichol, with looks and gestures of shock when it happened.

And when former U.S. champion and 2010 Olympian Mirai Nagasu finished her short program, she expressed her dismay with a shake of the head and a wry twist of the mouth.

Tukhtamysheva, 17, the phenom in 2011 who had taken seeming knockout blows over an eight-month stretch in 2013, had the command of a champion in her 2 minutes, 50 seconds on the ice at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates.

With a personal best 67.41 points, Tukhtamysheva has a small lead going into Sunday's free skate over the latest Russian prodigy, 15-year-old Elena Radionova (65.57). Radionova had skated well enough on the Grand Prix circuit and Russian championships last season to have been a potential factor at the 2014 Olympics if she had met the minimum age requirement to compete.

Gold's goose-egg for her combination spin and a two-footed landing on the second part of her jump combination took at least five points from her, leaving her third at 60.81.

Mistakes on two of Nagasu three jumping passes cost her dearly, dropping her to 10th of the 11 women with just 49.29 points.

"It's kind of funny embarrassing to do such a good program and to miss on such a little thing," Gold said of her slipshod spin. "Frank and Lori's reaction … they perhaps overreacted slightly."

It would have been easy for Tukhtamysheva to exaggerate reports of her demise after a 10th at the 2013 world championships was followed by a 10th at last season's Russian championships, especially given the number of gifted young countrywoman who had emerged since she had won her first two senior Grand Prix events at age 14.

"I never even thought about quitting figure skating because I always felt I wanted to finish what I have been doing on a high note, to justify all the work over the years that I have put into it so that it was not in vain," she said.

Her dismal showing at the Russian nationals meant Tukhtamysheva would have no serious competition for 10 months. That figured into her international competition schedule at the start of this season: Skate America is her fourth event in five weeks in four countries and two continents.

She won the first three, all events a level below Skate America, opener of the annual Grand Prix Series.

"It was important to work on the competition feeling so that I would be prepared for the Grand Prix," Tukhtamysheva said. "I think it was the right decision. I feel a little tired but it is a nice tiredness."

Radionova, world junior champion the last two years, drew on skating history to deal with being talented enough but not eligible for the 2014 Olympics in her home country.

"It may be for the better," Radionova said. "If you look at Mao Asada and Yuna Kim, they were also too young the first time in 2006, but they still became champions."

Indeed they did. Japan's Asada won three world titles and Olympic silver. South Korea's Kim has Olympic gold and silver and two world titles.